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1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to an image processor/generator for representing a complex color raster image as a collection of objects in a hierarchical and device independent format and, more particularly, to an SI format that includes not only source data, but also the image processing operations required for rendering them and supports re-editability, customization and enhancement, automatic image assembly, and high performance imaging using an appropriate user interface.
2. Description of Related Developments
Commercially available packages in use today require considerable memory to operate. For example, Adobe Photoshop.RTM. stores three copies of the full size raster during interactive editing. Thus, a typical 24-bit color image (81/2.times.11 at 300 dpi) can require 24 megabytes of memory for each image copy.
Further, commercial software often exhibits sluggish to poor performance when editing large imagery. Again, Photoshop.RTM. must store, as discussed above, three copies of the image (no matter how large it is). Since every interactive operation processes the full image, performance is extremely slow.
Additionally, typical commercial software stores output imagery as complete rasters. Therefore, for each new version of an image, a complete raster must be written out and you cannot undo the operations contained in those versions. At 24 megabytes per image, as discussed above, disk requirements can be extensive. Also, archiving such imagery can require extensive storage space as well.
Further, a critical need exists for an image processor in the commercial printing arena with the ability to create a job template for constructing multiple, customized images. Few, if any, commercial image processing packages exist that will allow the creation of such job application templates. Additionally, commercial image processing software packages, such as Photoshop.RTM., have limited ability to render the output image optimized for the output device. Typically, color correction and simple resolution conversion is all that may be applied.
Additionally, in typical commercial image processing software, the ability to edit the list of image processing operations performed by the operator is also very limited. For example, Photoshop.RTM. allows only one undo operation. Also, typical commercial software does not allow for the optimization of image processing. That is, once an image is created, the ability to combine operations and increase performance on high resolution imagery is lost.
Finally, there exists a strong industry interest in structured document theory and how this technology can affect products and services. Current structured document theory considers a raster image as a simple content block with no hierarchical nature or image processing operations associated with it. For a page oriented description, see IEEE Computer Graphics & Applications Journal, Mar. 1991, pages 71-78, "Constructive Page Description," by J. Schonhut, H. Wiedling and V. Samara. For a general description of structured documents, see "Structured Documents", by J. Andre, R. Furuta and V. Quint, Cambridge Series on Electronic Publishing, 1989.